Services This Week
Dear All,
Services this week are taking place in person or via livestream through our YouTube Channel. Please find gathering times and service sheet links below.
Wednesday 5 March / Ash Wednesday
12noon - Holy Communion
Sermon: ‘From Ashes to Ashes and Dust to Dust’
Service Sheet: Here
Friday 7 March
10.30am - BCP Holy Communion (Revd Dr Mark Scarlata)
Sunday 9 March / First Sunday of Lent
11am - Holy Communion
Sermon: ‘Temptation in the Wilderness’
Service Sheet: Here
Other notices:
Ash Wednesday: A special service, integrating the traditional liturgy and imposition of ashes with reflective readings and music, will be held in the church at 12noon today (Wednesday 5 March) to mark the beginning of the Lenten season. All are welcome!
Lenten Catechesis Classes: These seminar-style classes, covering the basics of the Christian faith, will begin on Wednesday 12 March at 7.30pm in the church and run for five consecutive Wednesdays during Lent (concluding on Wednesday 9 April). Sessions will run for an hour and tea & coffee will be provided. The topics covered in each session will be as follows: (1) Baptism, Confirmation, Confession; (2) Eucharist & Scripture; (3) Church & Priesthood; (4) Discipleship, Marriage, Singleness; and (5) Mission & Outreach. A Zoom link will be made available for each session to those who are unable to join in person – please email the church administrator if you require the link.
Gardening Day: On Saturday 29 March, from 10am until 12noon, Hugh Wright will be coordinating a spring tidy-up of the churchyard and we would welcome as many volunteers as possible from the congregation to undertake this much needed work. Thank you!
Volunteer Rota: In addition to the sign-up sheet in church, we are making it easier to volunteer by attaching an online rota with the weekly email here. (N.B. There will be an initial delay before access is granted to the form, in order that only church members can see and edit it.) Please do consider if you are able to help out in any of the ways listed – we are particularly in need of regular volunteers to set-up tea and coffee and stay a little longer after each service to wash-up/leave away. Many thanks!
Giving: As always we are grateful for all of your gifts! Offerings may still be given during this time via a basket collection during live services, Standing Orders, or one time bank transfer, via BACS (Sort Code: 20-17-19 / Account Number: 30851477 / Account Name: St Edwards Church). There is now also a SumUp machine by the door of the church, for those of you who wish to give contactlessly: Simply power on, enter the amount you wish to give on the screen, and then tap your card.
Exciting Holiness (Friday 7 March):
The moving, contemporary account of these early third-century African martyrs proved to be of great significance in the life of the early Church. Vibia Perpetua was a young, married noblewoman of Carthage and Felicity was her personal slave. Saturus was possibly a priest and there were two other men, Saturninus and Revocatus, the latter also a slave. Felicity was pregnant. It seems most of them were catechumens when arrested and only baptized later in prison, where Perpetua had a vision in which she climbed a great ladder into paradise. They were condemned as Christians by the Roman authorities and dispatched to the public arena, there to be mauled by wild animals. They all survived and were then taken to be executed by the sword. Before this, they exchanged the Kiss of Peace and affirmed their faith in Christ, the Son of God. The account of their martyrdom was widely circulated in secret throughout the Christian congregations and proved both to give renown to their courage and to give encouragement to their fellow Christians in the face of adversity. They were martyred for their faith on this day in the year 203.
Holy God, who gave great courage to Perpetua, Felicity and their companions: grant that we may be worthy to climb the ladder of sacrifice and be received into the garden of peace; through Jesus Christ your Son our Lord, who is alive and reigns with you, in the unity of the Holy Spirit, one God, now and for ever. Amen.
